Iran
arrests members of sex trade ring
01/Aug/01
Copyright 2001
Reuters Ltd.
TEHRAN, Aug 1 (Reuters) - Iranian authorities have arrested
members of a prostitution ring engaged in smuggling young girls to
the United Arab Emirates, a newspaper said on Wednesday.
The gang, led by a 50-year-old woman in southwestern Iran, sought
young girls to sell into sex-slavery to customers mainly in Dubai,
the conservative daily Abrar said.
The woman, identified only by her first name as Fariba, her
daughter and other ring-members were arrested by agents of the
Intelligence Ministry earlier this week.
In a similar case reported by the official IRNA news agency, a
court began trials last month of four women charged with selling
girls aged between 13 and 17 to Arab customers in the UAE for sex.
Cases of runaway girls, mostly from broken families, becoming
victims of prostitution rings, human trafficking gangs and murder
have drastically increased in Iran over the past years, IRNA said.